The present invention relates to an automatic message prediction system for reducing network bandwidth required by messaging systems.
Communication between computer systems generally follows a protocol where data, for example the content of an email, is transmitted in packets. Messaging systems may also include functionality which:
checks that all received packets which make up a message have been received;
orders the received packets such that the original message is correctly re-constructed; and
corrects errors at both a packet and a message level.
Traditionally, error correction software involves some form of checksum which reveals that an error exists and causes a request for re-transmission to be sent to the original transmitter. More advanced systems use multiple checksums to enable the identification of an individual bit which is incorrect such that the incorrect bit can be corrected.
In this respect, existing messaging systems aim to ensure the totally accurate transmission of an entire message. However, this approach results in the transmission and re-transmission of massive volumes of data and significantly increases network loads. For example, a Lotus Notes email system operates through the replication of messages between databases. At a user level, a local replica of the User""s mail database is routinely replicated with a database located on the corporate database.
It is an object of the present invention to mitigate such problems.
Accordingly the present invention provides an automatic message prediction system operable in a communications system including a transmitter and a receiver, said receiver comprising: means for receiving at least a portion of a message from said transmitter; means for identifying from said message portion, a message previously received by said receiver; means for determining a substantially unique characteristic for said previously received message; means for transmitting said characteristic as a prediction of the remainder of said message to said transmitter; and means, responsive to receipt from said transmitter of an indication that the prediction is correct, for completing said message from said previously received message.
An important benefit of this invention is that there is no need for totally accurate prediction of the message, as an incorrect prediction will not result in an incorrect transmission. Similarly, if the receiver does not recognise a previously received message or its predictions are not accepted by the transmitter, the receiver simply awaits the complete transmission of the original message.
The invention can be implemented as an automatic message prediction proxy cooperable with an existing message system without the need to integrate directly into the existing system. Alternatively, it is possible to include the invention as an integral part of a messaging system.